Saturday, November 29, 2014

Things to be thankful for...

So, it's Black Friday weekend, and all of us have been trying as hard as we can to get screen time. Everybody was on their DS on Thursday since we spent a lot of it in the car. My older son is working on Pokemon Alpha Sapphire on his Nintendo 3DS, and my younger son was playing more Scribblenauts and some Desktop Tower Defense on his 2DS. About the only thing that I bring to play on DS is my Korg DS cartridge, and I had fun figuring out how to make some drum noises that don't really sound like drums.

My older son and I are still trying to unlock all of the characters on Hyrule Warriors, and it seems like we've had to do a lot of repeated boards to get our characters leveled up enough to face the later challenges. I still have a long way to go on the WiiU version of Bayonetta and the new Bayonetta 2. I was in Gamestop the other day and my regular cashier asked me if I had started the new Smash Bros. game for WiiU, and my exasperated answer was that I still had a long way to go on the last two games that I got! We haven't even talked about the new LEGO Batman 3 game, since my older son and I are casually pretending that the game's not out yet so we're not inundated for requests from my younger son to pick up the game some weekend with Christmas on the way.

The first add-on pack for Mario Kart 8 came out a couple of weeks ago, and the playable Link character and the Hyrule Castle board are both nice additions to the game. I haven't played with the Tanooki Mario or Cat Peach characters yet, but I did see that some of the other courses make for some multiplayer insanity. The Excitebike course has super-long straightaways leading to lots of shell-flinging shenanigans. Ice Ice Outpost is full of multiple paths most of which require rather precision driving or you will easily find yourself taking an ice bath.

So, even though I haven't picked up either of the newest systems, the PS4 or the XBox One, it still seems like there are plenty of games to play. There are still games coming out for the PS3, and the WiiU seems to have a steady stream of new releases coming out soon to be bolstered by the presence of the newest addition to the WiiU system, the amiibo. Similar to their Skylanders and Disney Infinity counterparts, an amiibo is a plastic representation of one of the Nintendo characters with some electronics inside that will identify it to the WiiU. Unlike the Skylanders and Disney Infinity characters which each require their own portal, the Amiibo can talk directly to the WiiU gamepad. There is a newer model of the 3DS that has not been released yet that will also be able to read the amiibo information. For the 3DS and 2DS units that are already out, there will be an external peripheral that will be released next year. Even more curiously, the amiibos do different things in different games. In Smash Bros., they become a specific character that you work on leveling up, in a very similar fashion to how they work in Skylanders and Disney Infinity. In Hyrule Warriors, different amiibos interact with the game in different ways. Some amiibos of the Zelda series characters give you weapons, and from the in-game description it sounds like some of the other ones give you random gifts (which I can only presume are materials to craft upgrades from). In Mario Kart 8, you can customize your Mii racer with an outfit based on the character that your amiibo is based on. I hope that they find other interesting ways to utilize these.

I am also looking forward to Street Fighter IV's upcoming Omega Mode patch, which will add a different version of each of the World Warriors to the line up, with different special moves and inputs. While the existing version of Ultra allows you to play as any previous Street Fighter IV version of any of the characters, the differences between those four versions are rather subtle and are just adjustments to the nuances of the game's balance. The Omega Mode versions are rather different, as you can see here.

So, what am I thankful for (as a gamer) this holiday season? I am thankful for the fact that there are more games out than I have time to play. That reminds me. I need to get ready for band practice.

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About Me

I'm a middle aged guy with a wife, kids, and pets. I don't get far from my Rubik's cube, and if you ask me about it I will show you. I try to pay attention to customer service and understand products, with mixed success. I like Zelda, Pikmin, Devil May Cry, Bayonetta, Sengoku Basara, Street Fighter, and playing music.